A Cross by any other name...smells like JtR?

[MrBarnett]

I don`t think he had much say in the design of his funeral card, but you never know, he may have designed the card in between filling in his beloved forms one evening.

Jon ,

Don't forget Lech managed to keep himself on the electoral roll after death, so perhaps there was something supernatural going on.

MrB

[Jon Guy]

Ed

So...
He took care to use his real name over money (surely he was known to everyone locally as honest Charlie Cross so why didn't he trade under that name?).

Banking, insurance or tax reasons ?

His relict called him Lechmere with no reference to Cross on his funeral card - presumably all his mates who knew him as Cross were dead by then also?

I don`t think he had much say in the design of his funeral card, but you never know, he may have designed the card in between filling in his beloved forms one evening.

But he didn't take care to call himself Cross when giving a witness statement - but arbitrarily chose to call himself by another unofficial name.
Even though this was a much more serious matter that he was involved in in his life - so far as we can tell.

It was that serious a matter, that even after they found Nichols he was still preoccupied with getting to work on time.

[MrBarnett]

Yep, a few doors away from another Mr Barnett.

There's a conspiracy theory just waiting to happen.....

I hadn't spotted that, what a tangled web that old East End was.

[Sally]

Am I right in thinking that by 1901 Lech's mother was a corn chandler in Gravel Lane?

Yep, a few doors away from another Mr Barnett.

There's a conspiracy theory just waiting to happen.....

[MrBarnett]

Ed,

I had found the 1891 census entry for Mrs F., but wasn't sure whether it was a retail or wholesale business. From what I have read most cat's meat dealers bought their meat already parboiled and threaded on wooden sticks from the abattoirs. They probably wouldn't have carried out much butchery themselves, certainly not the type that would involve the use of bone saws. But perhaps there was extra profit to be made in obtaining hunks of bone-in horse flesh from the slaughterers and preparing it oneself.

Am I right in thinking that by 1901 Lech's mother was a corn chandler in Gravel Lane?

MrB

[Lechmere]

Jon
So...
He took care to use his real name over money (surely he was known to everyone locally as honest Charlie Cross so why didn't he trade under that name?)
He took care to call his kids at school under his real name.
His relict called him Lechmere with no reference to Cross on his funeral card - presumably all his mates who knew him as Cross were dead by then also.

But he didn't take care to call himself Cross when giving a witness statement - but arbitrarily chose to call himself by another unofficial name.
Even though this was a much more serious matter that he was involved in in his life - so far as we can tell.

OK - you go with that - I am happy to reject that as a suggestion.

[Lechmere]

Mr B
With respect to Charles Lechmere's choice of the name Cross - yes indeed, in my opinion he wanted to keep the name Lechmere out of it and took the risk that he might be checked out at his home or workplace - mitigated by his personal performance in deflecting any suspicion on his shoulders.

In many respects Charles Lechmere was a regular family guy - but if he was the culprit this was clearly a veneer - as is the case with most outwardly normal looking serial killers. And most serial killers were outwardly normal looking. It is only when they are put under the microscope that they look less normal.
We are working with limited resources with which to discern anything about Lechmere's personality - one is the records.

His mother is recorded as being a horse flesh dealer for cat's meat purposes in the 1891 census and in trade directories into the mid 1890s.
She was the based just around the corner from where the Pinchin Street torso was found (they had all lived in Pinchin Street at various times in the past).
In the early 1890s Charles Lechmere ran a shop from a street where at least from 1928 his son ran a cat's meat stall.

His mother had a cat's meat production business.
His son had a cat's meat business from almost the same location as he had a shop at the same time his mother had a cat's meat production business.

It is conjecture - conjecture only, but not without some foundation - that Charles Lechmere had some connection to the cat's meat business as a side line - which helped him to set up his own shop when he fully retired from being a carman.

[Jon Guy]

Ed

.
It is only really conceivable that Lechmere was in effect legally summonsed to the inquest immediately after his statement was given.

Ok, fair enough. So, he`s signed his statement as Cross, and the policeman then informs him that he may or will be required to attend the inquest. Does he ask for the statement back so he can alter his name to his legal name?

You seem to be suggesting that giving a statement to the police following the brutal murder of a woman is 'regular stuff' and not legal? .

Yes.
How would giving a witness statement affect him legally?

More 'legal' than entering his name in a Trade Directory?
More legal than a baptism?
More legal than entering your name as a parent for your kids at school (attendance was a requirement, entering a legal name was not)..

I suspect that where money, God, and his kids were involved, he took extra care to ensure the legal name was applied.

[MrBarnett]

Ah,

I must only challenge the canon, not the apocrypha.

I'm glad we seem to have arrived at an agreement that Charles was just a reg'lar guy doing his best for his family and society. Makes him more interesting as a suspect, I think.

When can we hear more about the cat's meat connection? That 's something I'd really like to get my teeth into. (Paws for reflection: I could have worded that better.)

MrB

[MrBarnett]

Ok it can be see as odd that he used Cross. And doubly so if he provided his work address, yet was not known as Cross there. Why bother to turn up at all? Why not give his name as Smith? Presumably because during the journey from Bucks Row to Hanbury Street he had let slip his place of work and fading into obscurity was no longer an option. Having had time to think things through (all this assuming he was guilty) he came up with a plan that achieved only one thing. It concealed the name Lechmere from the official record, and possibly more importantly, from the newspapers. Not his identity but his legal name. If that was indeed his plan he was trying to prevent a connection between the name Lechmere and the murder of a prostitute. I wonder why.

MrB

[Lechmere]

Mr B
Yet again you have put your own prejudicial spin on things.
You keep returning to this theme for some reason.

No one has suggested that there is anything 'suspicious' in Charles Lechmere's record keeping.
I'm sure I did use the word anal in respect of Charles Lechmere.
Yet again I refer you back to the four grounds I gave you for this which are not directly linked to the quantity or completeness of the 100 plus records.

[Lechmere]

Jon
I agree that when he gave his details to the police he may not have anticipated being called to the inquest.
However it is exceptionally unlikely given the timescales available that the coroner independently went through his statement and called him.
Theory and practice in the calling of witnesses to inquests were two different things as has been demonstrated several times on various threads on this forum.
It is only really conceivable that Lechmere was in effect legally summonsed to the inquest immediately after his statement was given

You seem to be suggesting that giving a statement to the police following the brutal murder of a woman is 'regular stuff' and not legal? (and that is without the summons to the inquest which must have followed swiftly afterwards).
That is novel.
More 'legal' than entering his name in a Trade Directory?
More legal than a baptism?
More legal than entering your name as a parent for your kids at school (attendance was a requirement, entering a legal name was not).

The inability for people here to just concede and say 'OK it can be seen as odd that he used Cross' is truly remarkable.

[MrBarnett]

Ed ,

I am trying to establish whether there is anything suspicious in Charles's record keeping, because I imagine I have detected that implication in some of your statements. I think you once used the word 'anal' and you often use the words 'control' or 'controlling', which in my fevered imagination puts a slightly sinister spin on things that wouldn't exist if you had chosen 'careful' or 'prudent'

I am not challenging for a moment that he may have been more prudent, careful, responsible choose whatever word you want (but perhaps not controlling) than the average casual labourer who pissed his wages away every night before he got home. The evidence suggests that Charles wasn't like that. So I think it is valid (for my purposes) to look at someone whose life was very similar to see how assiduous he was at record keeping.

I'm curious, what was the procedure for delivering electoral forms to householders in the LVP? Whatever it was it clearly worked, just look at rolls, street after street where the vast majority of households had a registered elector.

MrB

[Jon Guy]

.

When judging Charles Lechmere’s use of the surname Cross when he eventually came forward prior to his appearance at the Nichols inquest, you can hardly bring forward as evidence in support of the normalisation of his use of the name Cross that one occurance. That is the one we are trying to judge.
Isn’t this blindingly obvious?

He gave the name as a witness, a good citizen doing his duty. He wouldn`t know he would be called to the inquest. The coroner would choose who he wanted to appear at the inquest from the witnesses. He may have given his "sunday best" name if he knew he would have to appear at an inquest.
As far as he knew, his part could have all been all over once he`d done his duty and given his statement over the police counter.

All the examples you have of the use of Lechmere are all legal stuff.(which is why you can find them in the records) The one example we have of him in regular stuff (ie not affecting him or his family legally) he uses the name Cross.

You see the difference ?

[Lechmere]

Dr Strange
When I said a chunk of his route would have been similar when he lived at James Street I was referring to a chunk of the Old Montague route, not the Hanbury route.
The chunk that may well have been the same was down Devonshire Street, the Harrow Ally dog leg and part of Middlesex Street, then down Wentworth Street to Commercial Street.

The photographs of Broad Street you put on another thread showed a lot of lighting because they were taken in open air in broad daylight.
One included gas lamps, but I pointed out where this picture was actually taken, which wasn’t within the goods station.

Paul didn’t say he was going to walk on past the body. You made that up.
What Schwartz did in different circumstances is totally irrelevant.
The issue in any case is not what Paul may or may not have thought he might do. It is what Lechmere – as the killer – would have been apprehensive about what Paul might do.

On when you think Lechmere’s boss may have taken him to the police station, we can strike out Saturday as the police denied the Paul/Lechmere version of who found the body as late as the Sunday night.
Sunday wasn’t a work day so we can realistically strike that day out as well.
Which leaves Monday. You think Lechmere turned up to work. Belatedly told his boss that he might be a key witness in the Bucks Row murder and the boss took him to a local police station.
Doesn’t sound very likely to me. But each to his own.

As has been pointed out before, Charles Lechmere’s father in law was called Thomas.
Thomas Allen Lechmere was his eldest living son.
Also the ‘Thomas Allen’ combination was of old Lechmere provenance.

When judging Charles Lechmere’s use of the surname Cross when he eventually came forward prior to his appearance at the Nichols inquest, you can hardly bring forward as evidence in support of the normalisation of his use of the name Cross that one occurance. That is the one we are trying to judge.
Isn’t this blindingly obvious?